There is a skill in presenting at the right pace and detail for your audience. In a physical meeting, this is facilitated by watching your audience’s body language, sensing their mood, adjusting tone and pace, and occasionally verifying impressions with explicit questions. Failure to do this can mean that the audience disengages from the presentation, key points go unrecognised, and energy levels drop.
Within virtual meetings, it is sometimes possible to see a panel of the webcams from all of the attendees, but that is not true of all software, and it is far more difficult (and distracting) to seek visual feedback in this way (even where it is possible). So how can this feedback be obtained?
One solution is to use a mood indicator within the ‘whiteboard’ environment. This enables people to place their cursors over the central OK section for as long as they are able to remain engaged, but if engagement becomes difficult because: the information comes to quickly; or slow pace leads to attention wander; or the language or concepts used are difficult to grasp, attendees can move (waggle) their cursor left, right or down to indicate the problem. and the presenter can readily see the shift and adjust their approach to deal with the problem: speeding up, slowing down, or asking/answering questions.
In the case of the mood indicator below, there is also an option to (non-disruptively) applaud points that the audience particularly agree with or are inspired by.
Incorporating the mood indicator into your whiteboard is easy, simply right-click copy the image below (or snip it) and then paste it into your whiteboard – but remember to have it in focus when the presentation is underway, and to explain its use to both the presenter and the other participants.
You may find it helpful to use this audience feedback in conjunction with a presentation timer to flag to the presenter when they need to wrap up.
Track your progress to ensure the efficacy of this strategy.